Athlone Ladies Finish Strongly in Junior Championship

posted 21 Jul 2015, 09:11 by Athlone GAA

Athlone
Ladies played two junior championship games last week and were
victorious in both. The first was a championship and league game
combined against St Josephs away on Tuesday 14 Jul and the Athlone Ladies team won by a margin of 5-13 to 0-10. The second game was in the championship against Moate (2) on Thursday 16 Jul and again the Athlone Ladies won by a margin of 1-6 to 1-3.

In
the first game the Athlone Ladies team dominated from the start and
while St Josephs fought back strongly in the second half, the result was
never really in doubt. The second championship game versus Moate (2)
was an excellent and compelling contest. Despite enforced changes
because of injuries to key players and an injury early in the game to
key player Eimear Connellan, the Athlone team played with great spirit,
the defence was robust and in a very hard fought first half, the score
line at half time was Athlone 0-5 and Moate (2) 0-2. Moate started the
second half very strongly and scored a goal and a point in the early
stages. However, it was during the latter stages that Athlone showed
true grit and resilience. With an excellent move up the full length of
the pitch that involved great running off the shoulder and a slick
interchange of passes, it was the young Caoimhe Mannion who had started
the move that resulted in her crashing the ball into the opponents net.
For the sheer determination, courage, team spirit and high levels of
skill, the Athlone Ladies deservedly came out victorious in this
excellent encounter.

It was noticeable that the
more experienced Athlone players had linked very well with the younger
players in both these games and that the team had developed into a real
force at the end of the five championship games. It is unfortunate that
qualification, it seems, has narrowly eluded this team of excellent
players for 2015. However, it was very encouraging to see such great
heart, determination, courage, skill and team spirit being displayed by
the Athlone Ladies. It is also encouraging that the panel for the final
game contained eight young under 16 players, all of whom played and this
augurs very well for the future.